


Kyoshi Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

by ConvenientAlias



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Azula isn't nice, Dysfunctional Relationships, F/F, Obsessive Behavior, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-03
Updated: 2018-07-03
Packaged: 2019-06-04 19:22:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15153926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConvenientAlias/pseuds/ConvenientAlias
Summary: Ten months after her release from the asylum, Azula decides enough is enough. She's going to visit Ty Lee. And if Ty Lee isn't happy about that, well, she should be.





	Kyoshi Wood (This Bird Has Flown)

Azula had been out of the asylum for almost a year, and Ty Lee had still refused to contact her. At first Azula had been patient. They hadn’t parted on the best of terms, the last time they saw each other being the one time Azula came to visit Ty Lee in prison, which had devolved into a shouting match and Azula almost burning Ty Lee’s face. It was understandable that Ty Lee was wary. But every day that passed without so much as a letter from Ty Lee, Azula grew a little more frustrated. And when it had been ten months, she decided she had waited long enough.

She’d known Ty Lee’s new address in a hidden corner of the capital ever since she moved there—even in prison she remained uninformed. She would go to visit Ty Lee herself.

“If you think about it she’ll probably be happy,” she said to her reflection in the mirror as she neatened her hair back. She wore it in a braid now, as she no longer had the small crown to put in her topknot. It looked unthreatening.

Ty Lee couldn’t be afraid when she looked like this, couldn’t be shy of her when Azula was going so far to renew their friendship, to let bygones be bygones. She just couldn’t.

“She’ll be happy. She’s easily pleased.” Except for the last two times Azula had seen her, when she had spit in Azula’s face and said she hated her all along, and had only pretended to love her. Azula frowned into the mirror. “Well, she should be pleased. What right does she have to ignore me like this? What…”

Her nails dug into her palms. No. She’d decided to be calm for this visit. “She’ll be pleased,” she said, forcing herself to smile. “After all, she’s always loved you.”

She put gel in her hair, forcing back the stray strands that constantly flew out lately, driving her crazy. Pulled on her nicest pair of boots. And walked to Ty Lee’s house.

It was a small wood house, underwhelming, but with a friendly yellow door. Exactly as Azula’s informants had described it. She touched the wood of the door gingerly. She knocked.

Ty Lee opened within moments, a smile already stretched across her face. “Hello, can I…” she trailed off. “Azula.”

Ty Lee had grown. They’d been only teenagers when it all went down, so perhaps that wasn’t surprising. Now she was taller than Azula by an inch or two. She still wore the same long braid and a red outfit with the midriff cut out, but it looked more mature on her now. Even her facial shape had changed a little, stretched a little. Or Azula had remembered it wrong. That was quite possible. It had been years.

Azula smiled. “I haven’t seen you since I got out of the asylum, so I thought I’d stop by.”

The smile leapt back onto Ty Lee’s face in response. “Of-of course. Um.” Azula pushed past her. “Please come in.”

The furnishings of Ty Lee’s house were simple. There was a single painting on the wall, a painting of a smoking volcano set against the ocean. Simple brushstrokes signified wind and stone, and a calligraphy inscription read, “Together we are strong.”

Everyone always talked about balance these days.

“Your house is lovely,” Azula said.

“Yep. Kyoshi-imported wood. A reminder of my time with the Kyoshi warriors. You’ve probably heard about that.”

“Oh, I’ve heard all sorts of good news about what you’ve been doing,” Azula said. “But I’d love to hear it from you in more detail.”

Ty Lee giggled. “Well, it’s all kind of boring. Um…you can sit down if you want.”

There was a low table but no cushions or chairs. Azula sat down on the paneled floor. It was harder than the sickeningly soft walls of her room at the asylum but softer than the stone of her old prison cell. She’d grown fond of wood in her brief period of freedom.

Ty Lee pulled out a cushion for her own knees and knelt down too. She did not offer one to Azula. “So. How’s freedom treating you?”

“It’s boring. I’m not allowed to leave the city, Zuko’s constantly checking up on me, and there are guards watching my house all the time.” She saw Ty Lee’s expression flicker and added, “Don’t worry. I lost my tail when I came here.” It was evening and it was always easier to lose them in the dark. She reached out to touch Ty Lee’s hand, but Ty Lee pulled away. “I thought you’d want our reunion to be private.”

“I didn’t expect you to come.”

“I sent you letters, didn’t I?”

Ty Lee smiled. “Yes. Yes, you did. Quite a lot of them.”

Azula didn’t ask why she never wrote back. She stood and circled around to Ty Lee’s back. “You look out of sorts.”

“Oh, you know. I have a job with a local acrobat company now and…stress of the vacation season.”

“Maybe I can help.”

Azula set her hands on Ty Lee’s shoulders and began to knead at them. Ty Lee had always been better at massages than her, but she was still proficient. Ty Lee said in a strangled voice, “Uh…you don’t have to, Azula. I’m…fine.”

“There’s a knot of tension right here.” Azula pushed at Ty Lee’s shoulder blades. “You should take better care of yourself, Ty Lee.”

“Really you don’t need to.”

“It’s fine.” Azula kept going. “I should do something for you. It’s been so long since we’ve seen each other.”

Ty Lee stood abruptly. “Tea! How about I get you tea?”

“I’m not Iroh. How about something stronger?”

Ty Lee had wine from Kyoshi Island too. She’d basically given up her Fire Nation roots, it seemed, despite living in the Fire Nation capital currently. Azula sipped and pretended she liked it. “Going to offer me dinner?”

“You haven’t eaten?”

“Maybe dessert, then,” Azula suggested, with a wicked smile.

Ty Lee didn’t answer. Azula reached out and brushed a hair off her cheek. “Come on, Ty Lee. Relax. We’re hardly strangers.”

“No, “ Ty Lee agreed. “We’re not.”

She sounded tired.

Azula said, “Well, I’ve been here a while. Are you going to give me a tour of the house?”

Of course she stopped the tour as soon as they got to the bedroom. She sat right down on Ty Lee’s bed. They’d shared beds many times in the past, sinful silk sheets or pathetic bedrolls on the road. This bed was some sort of wool, and it was colored green. Another reminder of the Earth Kingdom. But Azula would stand for it. She pulled Ty Lee down to sit next to her. “You have a nice bed.”

“The frame’s Kyoshi wood,” Ty Lee said. She wet her lips. “I have a small garden out back, too. I can show you…”

“It’s too late to go outside,” Azula said. She put an arm around Ty Lee’s waist. “Come on, Ty Lee. Let’s relax.”

“I…”

“You don’t know how much I’ve missed this.” She pulled Ty Lee against her body. Ty Lee was a little big to lean as easily on Azula now, and her body was still so tense despite the massage earlier, but she smelled just like Azula remembered and it was so good to hold her close. “I missed you.”

Ty Lee said, “I’m sorry.”

“I was insane,” she admitted. “I was angry, all the time. Sometimes I thought of you in prison and I was angry.” She nuzzled Ty Lee’s hair. Why was it still up? “But I could never stay mad at you. I dreamed about you.”

“I thought about you too.” Ty Lee’s voice was soft.

It was all Azula had wanted to hear. With one hand she turned Ty Lee’s head for a kiss. Ty Lee accepted, less eagerly than usual, true, but that could be excused. It was an emotional day for both of them.

“I love you,” she said.

“I love you too,” Ty Lee said, in her usual bright voice. A little shaky. “But…”

Azula pulled the tie off her braid and began to unwind her hair. “Is something the matter, Ty Lee?”

“Azula.” Ty Lee caught her hands and placed them on the mattress. “I, uh.”

“What is it?”

Ty Lee smiled wide. “How about we take a bath together? I know you like that.”

Azula’s eyes widened. “You’re changing your tune quickly.”

“I want you.” Ty Lee poked Azula in the chest. “But let’s make this good.”

Ty Lee’s bath was a sorry thing. There was a pump inside but the bath itself was small and initially you could only get cold water—not that that would matter to Azula, who warmed it up easily. She was naked in the water when Ty Lee returned with another cup of wine. “Drink this. I’m going to get undressed.”

“You can do that here.”

“I…I have a surprise for you. Wait for me.”

Azula drank the wine down and settled back in the bath. She waited, and as she waited the room grew wavery and dark.

She fell asleep.

In the morning she came to with a headache in lukewarm water, probably only heated still by her own inner fire. She rubbed her eyes. There was too much light coming in the curtained window. “Ty Lee!” she called. “Ty Lee!”

Ty Lee was nowhere in the house. Nor had she left a note.

Azula dressed quickly. She did her hair again, though not as carefully. No one she wanted to see it today. No Ty Lee to show off to. Well, not in that way.

She’d tried to be a good girl for Ty Lee, show she could be magnanimous to someone who’d abandoned her. But she didn’t give her best behavior to people who gave her drugged wine and ran out on her, refusing to even reject her to her face. Someone like that, she owed nothing.

“Kyoshi wood,” she murmured. She found cooking oil in Ty Lee’s closet, probably from the South Pole or some such bullshit. She poured it here and there in Ty Lee’s bedroom, making sure to spatter the bed well. Then she went to the doorway and threw a spark.

Kyoshi wood burned easily.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fic because I heard the Beatles song "Norwegian Wood" and thought to myself, that's a Tyzula song. So now it is.  
> Comments are much appreciated! Or come talk to me on tumblr at convenientalias.


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